Thursday, January 28, 2016

"I would like to share with you a brief letter that was published some time ago in an Italian Orthodox parish newsletter. Its author, Archpriest Gregorio Cognetti, is the Dean of the Italian parishes under the Moscow Patriarchate. This letter was generally liked by the Italian Orthodox converts, and also received a high degree of appreciation among some cradle-born Orthodox (it was, for instance, translated into Romanian); I hope it may be prove an interesting reading and a source of inspiration for all of you.

Chapel Hill (U.S.), March 1982

Dear Bill,

Even though you never asked it directly, I feel from your words that you do not yet understand why I left the Roman Church to become Orthodox.

You were even a member of one of the least latinized Byzantine parishes, you seem to say, why, then?…

I guess I owe you an explanation, since, a long time ago, when we were both members of the Latin church, we shared the same feelings. These same feelings brought both of us to a Byzantine rite parish, and then myself to Orthodoxy. You could not have forgotten the criticisms that we moved to the Romans: the continual insertion of newtraditions in place of the old ones, Scholasticism, the legalistic approach to spiritual life, the dogma of papal infallibility. At the same time we both reckoned the legitimacy and correctness of the Orthodox Church. A Uniate parish seemed the optimal solution. I remember what I was saying in that period:

I think like an Orthodox, I believe like an Orthodox, therefore I am Orthodox.

Entering officially into the Orthodox Church seemed to me just a useless formality. I even thought that remaining in communion with the Roman Church might be a positive fact, in view of the goal of a possible reunification of the Churches.

Well, Bill, I was wrong. l believed I knew the Orthodox Faith, but it was just a smattering, and quite shallow for that. Otherwise I would not have failed to know the intrinsic contradiction between feeling Orthodox and not being reckoned as such by the very same Church whose faith I stated I was sharing. Only a non-Orthodox may conceive an absurdity like being Orthodox outside of Orthodoxy. Individual salvation does not only concern the single person, as many Westerners believe, but it must be seen in the wider frame of the whole Church Communion.

Each Orthodox Christian is like a leaf: how could he receive the life-giving sap if he is not connected to the vine? (John 15:5)

Orthodoxy is a way of life, not a rite. The beauty of the rite derives from the inner reality of the Orthodox Faith, and not from a search for forms. The Divine Liturgy is not a more picturesque way of saying Mass: it comes forth from, and strengthens, a theological reality that becomes void and inconsistent if excised from Orthodoxy.

When the spirit of the Orthodox Faith is present, even the most miserable service, done in a shack, with two paper icons placed on a couple of chairs to serve as the iconostasis, and a bunch of faithful out of tune as the choir, is incomparably higher than the services in my former Uniate parish, in the midst of magnificent 12th century Byzantine mosaics, and a well-instructed choir (when there was one).The almost paranoid observance of the ritual forms is the useless attempt to make up for the lack of a true Orthodox ethos. I was deluding myself when I believed I was able to be an Orthodox in the Roman communion.

It was a delusion because it is impossible.

The continual interference of Rome in the ecclesiatical life reminds you in due course who is in command. To pretend to ignore this is self-delusion. I tried to avoid the problem, feigning to be deaf and dumb, and repeating to myself that I belonged to the ideal “undivided Church”. My position was quite sinful. First of all, because the undivided Church still exists: it is the Church that never broke with Her past, and that is always identical to Herself: in other words, the Orthodox Church.

Then, because that feeling of being a member of the Undivided Church, which I considered so Christian and irenical, was instead a grave sin of pride. I was practically putting myself above Patriarchs and Popes. I believed I was one of the few who really understood the Truth, beyond old and sterile polemics.

I felt I had the right to ask the Eucharist both from the Romans and the Orthodox, and I felt unfairly treated when the latter denied it to me. I have a great debt of gratitude towards a priest who, in that time, refused to give me Communion. Instead of softly speaking of canonical impediments, as if the matter were a merely bureaucratic problem, he said me bare-facedly:

If it is true that you consider yourself an Orthodox, why is it that you keep belonging to heresy?

I was deeply shocked by those words, and for a long time I did not return to that Church. But he was right. I had understoodwhat Saints, Fathers, Bishops and Priests had not understood for centuries.

According to me, the schism between East and West was a tragic misunderstandingbased merely on political problems and the ponderings of the theologians. And in doing so I indirectly accused many holy people of calculation, superficiality and bigotry. And I was mistaking all of this for Christian charity…

No, Bill, it is impossible to be both Roman Catholic and Orthodox at the same time.

The rite is not all that important. After all, the Latins were Western Rite Orthodox for many centuries. I agree with you that, after the separation, the Romans and the Orthodox have still much in common, but this is not enough to consider both of them part of the same Church. Beyond the well-known doctrinal differences, there is the approach to the Supernatural, the same life of the Church that makes impossible to live the two religious realities at the same time.

We state in the Creed:

“and (I believe) in One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church”.

Until a unity of faith comes, they will be two churches.

The theory (also affirmed by John Paul II) that the Romans and the Orthodox are still the same one Church (despite the schism, and in a mysterious way) sounds well, but it doesn’t hold. It is based only on beautiful words. The differences of faith, on the other hand, do exist, and they are not a mere word-play.

Yes, I know that theological dialogue has been started, and it is even possible (everything is possible to the Lord) that eventually the unity will be reached. But beware! Many good Romans believe that the differences might be resolved by means of a clever statement that, owing to its genericness may sound acceptable by both parties. Having reached an agreement on this statement, both would interpret it according to their understanding, in fact keeping their opinions. Worse still, some propose a unity in diversity, without a formal commitment of faith from any part, but under the universal co-ordination of the Pope of Rome.

Well, all of this is impossible. The Fathers taught us that the the agreement on common faith must be univocal and unequivocal.

Orthodoxy follows the spirit of the Law, rather than the letter. And since it is impossible for the Orthodox Church to introduce new doctrines, it falls on the Romans to abandon a millennium of innovations, and unreservedly return to the faith of the Catholic and Apostolic Church.

This is the only possible platform for an agreement.

History has shown the fallacy of otherwise based unions. And now let me ask you a trivial question: Bill, is the Pope infallible (on his own and not by virtue of Church consensus, as specified in the 1870 dogma) or not? He may not be fallible and infallible at the same time, as it would happen if the two churches were still part of the same Church. One of the two must be wrong.

But Vatican II allowed a great freedom of opinions…

you may answer. Yet this is a sophism. The true Church may not fall in error. If you believe that your Church has erred, or that She is actually erring, you deny that She is the true Church.

I embrace you with unchanged friendship and love in Christ.

Gregorio.

(PS. For the record, Father Gregorio Cognetti told me that the recipient of this letter, soon afterwards, converted himself to Orthodoxy — he is now a tonsured reader of the O.C.A. in Florida — and that this letter was a major factor in his conversion)Source"

We Shall See Him As He Is by Archimandrite Sophrony Sakharov, ISBN 0-9512786-4-9

Wisdom. Let Us Attend: Job, The Fathers, and The Old Testament by Johanna Manley, ISBN: 0-9622536-4-2

Words of Life by Archimandrite Sophrony, Trans. by Sister Magdalen, ISBN1-874679-11-8

Writings from The Philokalia On Prayer of The Heart, Trans. by E. Kadloubovsky and G.E.H. Palmer, ISBN: 0-571-16393-9

This is a journal of my experience as

an Orthodox Christian with an

emphasis on my inner struggle, in

particular; the search for the 'heart'

and its purification, which is the way

to God and to our participation in

His Uncreated Energy.It includes photos and stories of my

travels to Greece, Serbia, Israel and

England.

An Orthodox Pilgrim

"Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it" Matthew 7:14

“Bear in mind that for cleansing your heart from sins you will obtain an infinite reward- you will see God, your most gracious creator, your providence. The work of cleansing the heart is difficult, because it is connected with great privations and afflictions; and therefore, the reward is great. ‘Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God’Matt. 5:8 St John of Kronstadt

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'The soul that has known the Lord

wants to see Him within her at all

times, for the Lord enters the soul

in quietness and gives her peace,

and bears silent witness to

salvation" St Silouan of Athos

"At the edge of your heart the Lord is standing with a tall candle that burns without smoking or melting. The Lord is standing and waiting at your invitation, to bring the candle into your heart and enlighten it, to burn up all the fear in your heart, all its selfish passions and all its ugly desires, and to drive out of your heart all the smoke and foul stench. At the edge of your mind the Lord is standing with His wisdom and with His Word, ready, at your invitation, to enter into it and drive out all its foolish thoughts, all its filthy fancies, and all its mistaken notions, and to erase from your mind all nonexistent images — the Lord is standing and waiting to introduce His reason, His seals, and His words." St Nikolai Velimirovich in Prayers by the Lake LXXIX

A Prayer by St Dimitri of Rostov

Open, O doors and bolts of my heart that Christ the King of Glory may enter!Enter, O my Light and enlighten my darkness;enter, O my Life, and resurrect my deadness;enter, O my Physician and heal my wounds;enter, O Divine Fire, and burn up the thorns of my sins;ignite my inward parts and my heart with the flame of Thy love;enter, O my King, and destroy in me the kingdom of sin;sit on the throne of my heart and alone reign in me,O Thou, my King and Lord.

The Heart is the Battlefield of Our Salvation

What is the heart?, "Thus, asthe bodily heart is the centerof the body's life, the spiritualheart is the center of ourspiritual life",Fr Spyridon Logothetis

Where is the heart? "The heartis within our chest. When wespeak of the heart, we speak ofour spiritual heart which coinci-des with the fleshly one; butwhen man receives illuminationand sanctification, then hiswhole being becomes a heart".Fr Zacharias Zacharou

"(God) is the One who hasfashioned the heart of every manin an unique and unrepeatable way"Fr Zacharias Zacharou.

"It is astonishingly great that Godthe Father, poured from His Spirita noetic sensation (noera aesthisis)or breath to the bodily hearts ofthose who rightly believed in theincarnate Logos". St Kallistos

A heart that has been made aliveby the waters of holy baptism andregeneration of the Holy Spirit hasthe kingdom of God within, "thekingdom of God is within you".Luke 17:21

"Since the kingdom of God is withinus, the heart is the battlefield ofour salvation, and all ascetic effortis aimed at cleansing it of allfilthiness, and preserving it purebefore the Lord". Fr Zacharias

The darkness and desolation of aheart ravished by sin is indeedapalling. In a heart that has notbeen purified, "there aredragons and there are lions;there are poisonous beasts andall the treasures of evil".St Macarius

"For it is within you, that is, itdepends upon your own wills, andit is in your own power, whetheror not you receive it. For everyman who has attained tojustification by means of faith inChrist, and is adorned by allvirtue, is counted worthy of thekingdom of heaven".St Cyril of Alexandria

And with the kingdom we receiveall the treasures of Grace. "Butthere is also God, also the angels,the life and the kingdom, the lightand the apostles, the treasures ofGrace -there are all things".St Macarius

Give me understanding, that I may keep your law and observe it with my whole heart.Lead me in the path of yourcommandments, for I delight in it.Turn my heart to your decrees, andnot to selfish gain.Turn my eyes from looking at vanities; give me life in your ways.Psalm 119:34-37

Prayer of Archimandrite Sophrony of Essex

"Oh Lord, I am weak. Thou knowest

this. In fear I seek the way to Thee.

Despise me not. Forsake me not in

my fall. Draw near even unto me,

who am of no account, yet I thirst

after Thee. Take up Thine abode

in me and do Thou Thyself perform

in me all that Thou hast

commanded of us. Make me Thine

for ever and ever, in love

unshakeable."

Recommended Reading List is at the bottom of the posts.

About Me

I am a lay Orthodox Christian.
Education: B.Sc. Biology and Chemistry, University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez, P.R.; The George Washington University, Medical Technology, Associate member of the American Society for Clinical Pathology